


Funeral rites of Cybertron

by Insecuriosity



Category: Transformers - All Media Types, Transformers Generation One
Genre: Gen, Ghosts of the machine writing challenge, Halloween 2017, It is a halloween fic, Rituals, Something will happen, Wakes & Funerals, Worldbuilding, gotmwc
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-12-09
Updated: 2017-12-09
Packaged: 2019-02-12 17:42:52
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,829
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12964893
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Insecuriosity/pseuds/Insecuriosity
Summary: Dirge does not like his job as a funeral Priest. He was never a mech that believed in rites and rituals, nor does he believe in Primus. That is not what makes his work so draining, however...It's what happensafterthe funeral.





	Funeral rites of Cybertron

Funerals never stopped being depressing, Dirge thought to himself. 

Standing in front of his mirror, he slowly checked each individual part of his gray ritual garb. Heavy metal clothes, carefully crafted to look light and airy, dragged him down – creating the slow meandering pace and droopy posture that was expected of a funeral priest.  
Shoulder-additions and a long ununtrium mask disguised his mass-constructed frame, and a thick scarf hid the voice-box controller that was welded into his throat. According to the head priests, his garb made him look like ‘a mech from age-old fables’. 

If you asked Dirge, it made him look like a misshapen, lumbering creature. Something to be feared as opposed to a normal Cybertronian with a function he had to fulfil. Then again, knowing age-old tales, his costume was a perfect fit.

He offlined his optics and luxuriated in the silence of his room. It would not be long before he would have to come out and face another day of work. The overwhelming and dreary music, mixed with the keens of mourning mecha and drums.  
He could already hear them if he listened carefully, even through the ground above his room, and the sound padding in the walls. This cycle’s death belonged to a person of note. Someone important.

Before he could convince himself to stay in his room and force the other priests come and get him, Dirge waddled out of his safe room and into the catacombs. The hall’s acoustics were specifically made to let his voice carry, and it made the chaotic din from outside five times louder than it should have been at this distance.  
At the very least the funeral was an acceptable excuse not to sing. During his rounds he had a choice between singing on his own, or waiting until the controller on his voicebox was switched on. His talent worked as long as he made noise, so it didn’t matter how it sounded. Dirge would take any moment of personal silence he could get. 

The catacombs were large, and he still had a long way to go before he reached the staircase that led upstairs. If his wings had not been weighted down, he would have flown up, but Priests didn’t need to fly. 

It was almost a relief to head up the staircase and leave the echoing hallways, but Dirge felt his reluctance getting heavier with each step he took.  
Once at the top, he was only a few more temple rooms separated from the crowd. The other priests were already preparing – all of them were just as overdressed as himself, with different patterns and colours to signify a colourful array of important figures from Cybertron’s distant past. Dirge had never bothered to learn about their significance. 

At Dirge’s arrival in the room, a few of the other priests came forward, carrying the unofficial final piece of his costume; an industrial rivet gun. Taking special care not to jostle the heavy metal cloths out of place, it was wriggled into his canopy, where it sat like a heavy weight against his chestplates.

They had held funerals many times before, and nobody spoke to him as they started the ritual. Dirge stayed behind as the priests entered the front hall of the temple. Judging from the deafening noises that rose, the cityformer they lived in had been commissioned to transform the front part of the temple to allow for more people to watch the funeral.  
As the other priests were spotted by the crowd, there was a short spike in noise – the sound of excitement almost drowning out the grief that was fit for a funeral. The Head priest sent out a burst of commlink static, and the noises of the crowd rapidly died down to static wispers. 

Dirge didn’t need to listen to the rites. Instead, pained reluctance warred with stage fright as his moment of performance drew nearer. As much as he would like to claim that his listless life had sucked all emotion from him, it wasn’t so. The closer he got to the moment of his performance, the faster his spark spun and the quicker the fuel in his lines pulsed.  
He could not longer tell if it was exhilerance or fear, but he didn’t have the time to investigate. The final rite was spoken, and a demanding ping dropped into his inbox. It was his moment to perform.

Swallowing his maelstrom of stress down until it burned in his throat, Dirge stepped through the door and into the open temple.  
The amount of noise, no matter how deafening, had not been an accurate representation of how many mecha were present. Just like he’d thought, the walls of the Temple had been folded open, and he could see the entire plaza in front of the temple. The dull grey city streets were hidden by hundreds of different paintjobs – all polished to perfection for the occasion – and camera-drones were hovering to capture every possible viewpoint of the funeral. 

Right in front of Dirge, elevated at a slight angle and displayed to the crowd, laid the deceased Prime. Optics half-lidded and empty, Modus Prime was surrounded by tokens and memoralabia, picked out by the mecha closest to him. Just at a glance, Dirge could see a half-empty pot of scented polish, a small flavoured ration, and a worn sparkling’s toy.  
Around the cask, the more impersonal gifts and items were stored. Endless boxes upon boxes carefully stacked to subtly divert all attention to the deceased, while at the same time boasting of his importance and wealth. Some of the boxes had a window on one side, where beautiful artworks, garbs, and fuels could be seen. 

And soon, all of it would be taken into the catacombs after the ceremony so that the Prime could take it into the allspark with him.  
Dirge doubted that there was enough room for it all.

At the edge of the mountain of gifts, the Prime’s servants were standing, sitting or kneeling, their heads respectfully lowered. Their last service to the Prime would be to carry his belongings into the catacombs. 

Carefully, Dirge walked until he stood at the Prime’s head. His fuel tank was churning, and the mechanisms in his hand were misfiring. Despite having done many funerals in just the same manner, he still feared that his voicebox would catch on that first note.  
He waited for the final sign, as the crowd seemed to draw an expectant breath. The controller on his voicebox made an almost inaudible click, and Dirge’s voice was freed. He opened his mouth, and sang. 

No melody was expected or needed. His ability stirred as soon as his voicebox activated, and he could feel how its power rolled over the crowd before him. Excitement and enthusiasm wavered and crumbled, followed by the prickling sensation of a thousand EM fields falling into grief.  
The laden silence began to break as began to click and hush with static. Mecha could not keep as silent as they wanted to – their engines hiccupping and backfiring. Optics squeezed shut, visors bled with extra charge, wings began to dip-

It did not take long before his contribution was deemed sufficient, and in the midst of a longer note, Dirge could feel the controller on his voicebox activating, choking him into silence.

-

It was very late into the cycke when the ceremony finally ended. The last of the camera mecha had been ushered out, and the sounds of crying and partying had slowly moved away from the temple. The walls and protective fencings had been transformed back into place, and things were returning to normal.  
The grand display that had been made to show the Prime’s frame off as a beloved and dear leader was being brought to the catacombs, and a gaggle of disposables was slowly but surely removing the garbage and scuffmarks around the temple. Tomorrow the temple would be open again. 

Dirge stood silently at the side as he watched the Prime’s servants carry the frame and its gifts downstairs. Through the sadness and grief of the day, the bustle of the servants was like a soothing light. Proof that life went on as always, even with the death of an important figure like the Prime.  
If it hadn’t been for his ritualistic clothing, he would have helped out. It would have been great to have a distraction from the rest of his duties later this cycle. As it was, he had to settle for guiding them around the catacombs, and listening to their chatter. It was all he could do with his voicebox still muted. 

They wondered and guessed at what was in the hellishly heavy boxes they were carrying downstairs. They muttered irritably at the display boxes with fragile gifts, having to carry them with the utmost care. They wondered who their new master would be. They wondered if they would be expected back in the palace to serve the next Prime.  
Nobody had told them anything, and Dirge would not be able to. 

“Worry not.” The high Priest said, after everything had been carried downstairs. “Primus will be your guide and master from tomorrow onwards, but today you can stay in the temple if you like.”

“Primus?... Does that mean that… we’re free? Like actual mecha?” A minibot piped up. He was a young bot, still fresh from whatever hotspot he was taken from. “We’re not owned anymore?”

“Exactly right.” The Head Priest smiled. “Staying the night in the temple will fulfil the last of your duties towards our Late Lord Prime. After that, you are free to seek new employment.”

Smiles were traded around the circle of servants and Priests. Everyone but the very youngest of them knew that a ‘free’ disposable was only free to enslave themselves once more, but judging by the scars and signs of malnourishment hidden under a fresh coat of paint, the late Prime had not been a good master. 

“For tonight, the temple will feed you and take care of you.” The Head priest said. “After everyone has filled their tank, we will start making sleeping arrangements. I think the private praying room should suffice – it has its own heating.”

“Oh, how exciting! I thought the back rooms of the Temple were only for holy mecha.” A young minibot rejoiced at Dirge. “I really should have expected better from the Priests of Primus – of course you would be welcoming to every bot!” 

Dirge said nothing. The energon was being brought out, and he was handed a full ration of sparkling clean energon. With a slow and measured movement, he let the energon swirl until he could see the smallest traces of impurity coming up from the bottom of the cube to mingle with the rest. He was not particularly hungry.  
The servants drank like they had not been fuelled well for decacycles, and they reclined like they would never get another chance to do so. Dirge would bet that, if there had not been priests around, they would have been sharing stories of debauchery and shame as well. 

“I really enjoyed your singing, erm, my priest.” The servant bot next to him said quietly, cradling his cube of energon. “It was…. It made me sad, but it helped to let a lot of bad stuff out. From the stories everybody tells about the funeral priests, I thought you’d be a lot scarier.”

Dirge offlined his optics, and tried to disappear into the folds of his heavy garb. The servant downed half his cube with a loud slurp. 

“I heard that you sing bots to their grave. That your voice makes the layer between this life and the allspark thinner, or something. And that if you listen for too long, you die. And that sometimes, they make mecha listen to you until they die. And that that’s why you have a controller on your voice.”

The servant fidgeted with his cube.  
“I don’t think that’s true though. They were just trying to scare me. Your singing isn’t bad, or deadly. Even though it made me more sad than I’ve ever been – I never felt more alive than when you were singing. It made me more aware of the things that made me happy, or something…”

Dirge said nothing.  
“Erm, I’m not a philosobot. That probably didn’t make any sense. I just wanted to say…thanks for that. For singing.” The bot meandered on. 

Dirge said nothing, and refused to lift his optics away from his own cube. 

The servant fidgeted. “Im sorry. I’ll leave you alone now - … erm …. Good nightcycle.” 

Dirge said nothing.

-

Despite knowing what he would have to face, Dirge still felt numb as he worked.

His hands moved on autopilot, tucking the offline servants into their corresponding boxes. The heavy filling that had been used to give the boxes some weight was piled around Dirge’s feet, waiting to be used again. 

The servants looked drunk and ill in their unconsciousness. Some of them had small trails of energon running from the corner of their mouth. It happened sometimes, when the numbing agent got to the motion centre first instead of the processor.  
With slow yet efficient movements, Dirge rearranged the limbs of a servant in a serene looking fold, before stuffing the empty spots in the casket with filling. 

The other priests watched from a distance. As the ritual demanded, the funeral priest had to perform the final acts on his own. Technically the catacombs were his territory, and his territory alone.  
Still, after his last mistake he was no longer trusted to act out the rite that would allow the Prime to take his belongings with him into the Allspark. 

With a silenced grunt, Dirge lifted the lid of the coffin, and slid it in place. Then, with his hands still on a numb autopilot, he got the nail gun out of his canopy.  
Before his ‘mistake’, it had been done manually – as the rituals demanded. An ornate hammering tool and special rivets had been part of his funeral garb – with the sharp bits pointed inwards too, for symbolism most likely. 

His mistake… Dirge had not closed the casket as tightly as he should have. He hadn’t patrolled and checked every crevice of the catacombs. He hadn’t called the alarm upon spotting the stumbling scared mech in the catacombs, nor had he tried to stop the fuel-starved escapee from breaking open cask after cask – freeing servant after servant…..  
Yes, after that, the gilded ornate tool and symbolic rivets had been replaced by a rivet gun. Impossible to flub, faster, and irreversible without the use of a specialised removal tool.

It did not take long before all the coffins had been filled and sealed. According to rite, the belongings of the Prime had to be ordened and arranged in a certain pattern and level of importance, but Dirge had not bothered to do it since his first funeral and none of the other Priests seemed to care.  
Nobody would be allowed in the temple to see the Prime’s burial chambers until a suitable period of time had passed, and by that time someone would be sent down to make an appealing and pleasant display. 

After all was done, Dirge dragged himself back to his room, and let his ritualistic garments slide onto the floor. The Head Priest had taken the rivet gun away from him, and the catacombs had been locked with Dirge still inside.  
His formal duty from here on out was to sing, so that the Prime’s servants may follow him into the All Spark – just like Modus Prime decreed in his will. 

Dirge, however, let himself fall onto his berth, and settled in for a wait. The energon dispenser in his room was just in arm’s reach, and he would not move again until he knew for sure that every single servant had starved.  
Dirge had miscalculated exactly one time – and he’d walked past the coffin of a mech who hadn’t fallen into stasis yet. If the guilt had been unbearable before, it had become insurmountable after then. 

The begging, the feeble sounds of scratching, the crying… If only there had been an edge he could use to wrench the lid off the coffin – if only there was a slit through which he could feed energon to a begging mouth – if only there was a way to smuggle the mecha past the chambers of the other Priests and the gates…. 

Dirge had been sparked as a war frame. A soldier. He’d known that he would be sending sparks back to Primus, but he’d always imagined that they would be able to fight back, or that he would have the opportunity to lower his weapon and turn away. 

Now that the tumult from the Prime’s funeral had migrated to the bars and café’s of the city, the catacombs were silent as death. Dirge stared ahead and waited for recharge to come to him.

**Author's Note:**

> Sadly, this year I had no spooky ideas. There was just nothing horror-related that was buzzing in my brain outside of this thing... This idea that it is common for Disposable mecha to be filed under 'owned items' that can be taken into the allspark. 
> 
> I think it works alright, though I am not insanely happy with it. I hope you enjoyed!


End file.
